Wiring arrangement



Dec. 27, 1949 MYDUL 2,492,236

WIRING ARRANGEMENT Filed July 22, 1946 IN VEN TOR.

1 interconnecting electrical Patented Dec. 21, 1949 WIRING ARRANGEMENT sum L. mam, Itasca, m, asslgnor in manila, Inc., a corporation of Illinois Application July 22, 1946, Serial No. 885,839

2 Claims.

This invention relates generally to wiring arrangements and in particular to means for interconnecting the terminals of electrical components such as used in radio sets.

In the prior art it has been the practice to connect electrical components, such as the components of a radio set into various circuit arrangements by soldering insulated wires to terminals provided on the components. In order to make a good connection, it is necessary that the wires be bent around the terminals and secured thereto by solder. The bending of the wires about the terminals is very tiresome work and requires a great amount of time. In many instances, such as in small radio sets where very little space is available, a great amount of skill is required in order that a good connection be made without interconnecting terminals and wires which should not be connected. In assembling such small radio sets it has been found that as much as one-half of the assembly time is consumed in the wiring operation.

In many electrical circuits, terminals ofseveral components are connected together in the circuit, that is, a plurality of components may be connected to a common source of potential or to ground. In the prior wiring. arrangements separate wires are required for interconnecting each pair of terminals even though a large number of terminals are connected at the same point in the circuit. This results in the use of a very large number of connections making it diflicult to trace the connections when servicing or repairing the equipment.

It is, therefore, an object of this invention to provide an improved wiring arrangement for components into a circuit.

It is a further object of this invention to provide simple unitary means for interconnecting the terminals of a plurality of electrical components which are connected at the same point in a circuit.

It is a still further object of this invention to provide a wiring arrangement which is of inexpensive construction and is easily applied to interconnect electrical components mounted on the chassis.

A feature of this invention is the provision of strips or sheets of insulating material having conducting coatings on one side thereof and.

. vision of a laminated structure including a plurality of strips of insulating material with conducting coatings on one side thereof in which the strips are arranged to connect electrical components in a circuit and the conducting coatings are kept from contacting each other by the insulating material.

A still further feature of this invention is the provision of a combination chassis and wiring arrangement comprising a laminated structure on which electrical components are mounted, the

laminated structure including insulating sheets having conducting coatings deposited on certain portions thereof to form electrical connections for the components.

Further objects, features and advantages will be apparent from a consideration of the following' specification taken in connection with the accompanying drawings in which:

Fig. 1 is a bottom view of a radio chassis in which the wiring arrangement in accordance with the invention is utilized;

Fig. 2 is a cross-sectional view along the lines of 2-2 of Fig. 1;

Fig. 3 illustrates a tion; and

Fig. 4 is an exploded view of the laminations of the structure of Fig. 3.

In practicing my invention I provide a chassis for an electrical device having components mounted thereon with terminals for connecting the components extending on one side of the chassis. The terminals for the electrical commodification of the invenponents are all in substantially the same plane and are of tapered configurat on. Strips made of insulating material such as fiber and" havin a copper orother conducting coating deposited thereon are arranged to interconnect certain of the terminals of said components. These strips have slots punched therein adapted to snugly receive the terminals. a secure electrical connection being made by soldering the strips to the terminals. Alternatively, the conducting coatings may be placed on sheets of insulating material on certain portions thereof to connect the desired terminals. The various sheets may then be secured together to form a laminated structure which is of sumcient rigidity to support the electrical components thereon.

Referring now more particularly to the drawings, there is shown a chassis I for a radio set or other electrical device having a plurality of.

components mounted thereon such as vacuum tube sockets II and intermediate frequency coupling unit II. A transformer II or other components required in a particular device may also be mounted on the chassis II. The various components are mounted on the chassis so that the terminals l4 thereof are positioned in approximately the same plane. The connection of various terminals .of the components mounted on the chassis is made through strips II and I}. These strips include an insulating portion l1 formed of fiber or other insulating material and a coating is of copper or other conducting material.

The strips are cut or punched from sheets of insulating material on which the conducting coating is deposited as by spraying conducting material in a molten state or by any other method. The insulating portions are of such dimension that the strips will be supported relatively rigidly between the various terminals, it having been found that strips three-sixteenths of an inch wide and from ten-thousandths (0.010) to one sixteenth (9;) of an inch thick are satisfactory. When copper is used as the conducting material, a quantity of copper is deposited to provide a conductor equivalent to a No. 22 or larger copper wire. The strips have slots [9 punched therein adapted to receive the terminals H of the various components, the terminals it being tapered as shown in Fig. 2 to faciiitate pressing the strips in place thereon. When the strips are in place, the conducting coating and the terminals are electrically bonded by solder. The conducting coatings are all placed on the same side of the various strips so that the strips may cross as indicated at 20 of Fig. 1 without causing electrical connection between the conducting coatings carried thereon. The strips, therefore, take the form of a laminated structure having alternate layers of insulating and conducting material.

In the drawings, for the sake of clarity, only two strips are shown. However, in actual practice, it may be desirable to use any number from three to seven or eight strips in a laminated arrangement to thereby eliminate a great part of the interconnecting winding usually required.

For example, in a simple radio circuit it may be desired to use one strip to connect various terminals to ground, a second to provide filament voltage for the tubes in the equipment and a third to provide screen voltage for the tubes. The terminals ll are provided with openings in the ends thereof to permit soldering of connections thereto in the usual manner, it being desirable in most cases to use conducting strips onlyin those cases where many components are connected to the same point in a circuit. The strips may be of such rigidity that they can be used to support various circuit components such as resistorsandthereonasshownatll. Such components may or may not be connected electrically to the conducting surfaces of the strips on which they are supported.

In Figs. 3 and 4 a modified arrangement is shown in which flat sheets 2|, I. and 21 of insulating material are secured together to form a laminated structure. The sheets are'secured together as by rivets II and form a chassis which supports components such as tube sockets 2| thereon. The components are provided with terminals II which are positioned in slots 32 in the laminations. The sheets II and II have coatings it and It deposited on portions of the bottom surface thereof arranged to contact certain of the terminals 3|. The coatings on the sheetsarearrangedasthestripsinl ig. ltointerconnect desired terminals. In assembling the components on the combined chassis and connecting assembly, the' components are first positioned on lamination II with the terminals ll positioned'in the slots 32. The proper terminals are then soldered to the coating It to make a good electrical connection. Thereafter sheet 26 is positioned against sheet 28 and the terminals soldered to the coating 84 thereon. It is apparent that any number of laminations can be used as required in a particular device. A bottom insulating sheet such as sheet 21 which does not have a conductive coating thereon may be provided to prevent unintentionalelectrical contact with the coating on the adjacent sheet.

- After all of the laminations are thus in position the laminations are riveted together to form a rigid assembly. The components may be secured to the laminated structure only by the terminals or additional securing means such as rivets ll may be used.

.From the foregoing description it is seen that a structure is provided wherein a plurality of terminals which are adapted to be connected at the same point in a circuit may be very easily interconnected by very simple means which provide an efficient assembly. It is apparent that the strip connectors can be assembled and soldered to the terminals much more rapidly than would be possible by using insulated wires and standard soldering lugs. Also, it is much easier to trace the circuit and to make repairs as all the interconnected points will be readily apparent.

While I have described what is considered the preferred embodiments of my invention, it is obvious that various modifications and changes can be made therein without departing from the intended scope of the invention as defined by the appended claims.

I claim:

1. In a chassis having electrical components mounted thereon with terminals projecting to one side of said chassis, means for interconnecting said terminals comprising, a plurality of strips of insulating material having slots therein for receiving said terminals, a conducting layer on one side of each of said strips covering substantially the entire area of said one side and extending about said slots, at least one of said strips having a portion overlying a portion of another one of said strips, all of said layers being on the sides of said strips facing in the direction away from said chassis, each of said strips being of such configuration to cover only a small part of the area of said chassis and so that the slots therein are positioned to receive said terminals, the dimensions of each of said strips 5 being such that said strips are relatively rigid and the conducting layers thereon provide good electrical connection, and means for electrically connecting said conducting layers to said terminals.

2. Structure in accordance with claim 1 including additional electrical components supported by said strips and having terminals thereon engaging said conducting layers.

AUGUST L. MYDLIL.

REFERENCES CITED The following references are of record in the file of this patent:

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